Fallout from announced closure of St. Patrick Hospital's labor and delivery department continues

June 4, 2025

To our community, our colleagues, and our patients:

As the Ob/Gyns of Western Montana Clinic, providing all obstetric and gynecologic care at Saint Patrick Hospital, we must correct the misleading statements made by CEO Mr. Bill Calhoun regarding the closure of the Family Maternity Center (FMC), effective October 10, 2025.

Despite Mr. Calhoun's assurances that this decision was carefully considered with input from "key clinical experts, community leaders, and internal stakeholders," this is categorically false. None of the physicians or clinical staff from the FMC, nor leadership of the Western Montana Clinic, were included in any decision-making process. We learned of our unit's closure on the morning of June 3rd — mere hours before the public announcement — through a meeting to which only one of our five Ob/Gyns was invited, and for the rest of us, via a hospital-wide memo.

Since its opening on August 3, 2015, the FMC team has provided exceptional, individualized care supporting women's autonomy in their birth experiences. For decades, the Western Montana Clinic has worked collaboratively with the Saint Patrick Hospital administration, believing we were partners in providing essential healthcare to our community. The characterization of this unilateral closure as a "collaborative effort" is not just inaccurate—it is a betrayal of that partnership and an insult to the dedication of each care provider, who has covered both scheduled and emergent women’s healthcare at Saint Patrick Hospital – every hour, of every day, and every week, year after year.

Healthcare decisions of this magnitude demand input from medical professionals who understand the clinical implications, and from community members who depend on these services. Excluding the very people who provide the care represents a fundamental failure of healthcare governance and a dangerous departure from patient-centered decision-making.

We are heartbroken to leave the exceptional team at Saint Patrick Hospital, where together we have provided compassionate and comprehensive women's healthcare, and truly felt we were serving our calling.

We will continue advocating for women's healthcare access in the greater Missoula community. We will honor your choices about how and where you access care, even as those options become increasingly restricted. We stand with all those who are affected by this decision to reduce access to women’s health care. Most importantly, we will continue providing the highest quality women's healthcare, regardless of the constraints now imposed upon us.

Respectfully,
Elise Abicht, MD
Janice Givler, MD
Candace Hoppe, NP
Jennifer Mayo, MD
Meghan Moorhead, MD
Sandra Richardson, NP
Amy Smith, MD

Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology Western Montana Clinic

A statement from the FMC staff to Saint Patrick Hospital administration:

We are writing to express our deep disappointment and concern regarding the abrupt closure of the Family Maternity Center—a place that was more than just a department within the hospital. It was a lifeline for families, a sanctuary for healing, and a home for the many healthcare workers who devoted themselves to bringing life into this world.

Many of us relocated from out of state as experienced nurses to help open and grow this unit ten years ago. Some left secure positions elsewhere to be part of something new—something that would offer more options for women in our community. Regardless of where we came from, we all arrived with the same purpose and belief: to create a space where families would be supported through every stage of childbirth. From the very beginning, we poured our hearts into this work. We were there for first breaths and final ones, standing beside families through moments of both joy and trauma. We saved lives. We built bonds that ran far deeper than numbers or productivity reports. This unit was created for the community, and it thrived because of the dedication and passion of its staff. To hear that this space is now being repurposed for profit—converted into ICU or Med Surg beds—is a painful blow, but what is even more disheartening is the way this decision has been handled. Despite a year of internal planning, we were given just 90 minutes notice to attend the meeting announcing the closure. We were offered no representation, no clarity about our futures, and no real chance to speak to the realities we now face.

Within our unit are individuals who are the sole providers for their families, women and men who rely on their healthcare benefits to support their families either battling cancer, have special needs children, or are medically complex themselves. We have mothers trying to make ends meet on a single income. Many of us left our former lives, worked night shifts for years, and finally found our dream roles on DAYSHIFT—only to have them stripped away with no concrete path forward. We have been told that there “may not be enough jobs” for us, but no definitive answers have been offered. After a year of planning, how can there still be so much uncertainty?You are losing some of the most skilled labor and delivery nurses, NICU nurses, surgical techs and unit coordinators in this region not just because the unit is closing, but because of the way this transition has been handled—without transparency, without compassion, and without integrity. This was more than a professional loss. It was deeply personal. The founding Sisters were courageous women who built this hospital with a clear purpose: to care for all in need, especially women and children. It’s hard not to wonder how heartbroken they would be to see how far their mission has been compromised today.

We deserve better. The community deserves better. If we are to move forward, we need answers, representation, and a plan that demonstrates respect for the lives and careers you’ve profoundly impacted.